Video Game Review: Star Wars: Tiny Death Star (Phones & Tablets)

I have played a lot of video games in my thirty-five years on this planet. Since the first iPhone dropped (I now have a much superior Windows Phone), I have been an avid gamer on my phones and tablets. That being said, this is one of the most pointless and mindless yet addictive games I have ever played.

Why do I call it mindless and pointless?

Well, there is really nothing to win in this game. In fact, for all I know, it isn’t a beatable game. It is a game that will essentially go on forever if you don’t permanently put it down at some point and even then, the “bitizens” within the game will continue to exist and buy everything in sight in their George Lucas inspired digital space consumerist society. This isn’t a complaint or a knock against the game. I think it is pretty awesome that this little world will continue to exist as long as it is on your device. You would literally have to uninstall the app and even then, the world would probably exist somewhere tucked away on some cold server in a server farm far, far away.

The objective of the game is simple. You have to build as many new levels in the Death Star as you possibly can. You also have to attract residents and use them to fill the jobs on all the new levels you create. At its core, Tiny Death Star is like a more intimate and more personal version of Sim City. Instead of running a whole city, like in that game, in this one it is like peering into one of your Sim buildings and controlling just that environment at a more precise level. Except your building is in space and it is filled with Stormtroopers and Rebel spies! I’ll take this version any day, although the kaiju attacks in Sim City were pretty friggin’ incredible!

As hard as I try, I find putting this game down impossible. Not an hour goes by that I don’t feel the need to check my inventory levels and to build up the evil lower levels of my Death Star.

Now the game only has so many options for types of levels you can build. I’m not sure if you are at a stand still and can’t advance if you use all the available options. Then again, there is an icon on each level option page that says “More coming soon.” So I guess as long as they keep developing new levels for this game, it can go on forever. The question is, will I or anyone make it that far?